Xiaomi, the Chinese company that recently made it to top 5 world’s largest smartphone makers, has big plans for the next decade or so. Although the handset maker has been attributed third place in the rankings, it only took Lenovo one day to dethrone Xiaomi.

Given the recent Motorola acquisition, Lenovo is now the third largest smartphone maker in the world due to combined sales of both brands. The deal between Google, the previous owner of Motorola, and Lenovo closed one day after the ranking was announced.

If you thought this would have pissed Xiaomi hard, then you can’t be more wrong. The fact that it was ranked three in top 5 world’s largest smartphone makers even for one day showed the company that everything can be obtained through perseverance.

Xiaomi now has ambitious plans regarding its smartphone business, at least according to the company’s CEO, Lei Jun. The folks at GSMDome report Jun said during an Internet conference that Xiaomi had the potential of becoming the world’s largest smartphone manufacturer in 5 to 10 years.

Currently, Xiaomi is not in a good position considering the fact that it’s mostly present in China, but the company plans to extend its operations internationally.

The plan is already in motion as Lei Jun announced that his company had already launched some of its most popular smartphone in 6 new countries, other than China: Hong Kong, India, Indonesia, Malaysia, Singapore and Taiwan.

Xiaomi needs to establish a strong foothold in various international markets

In order to achieve its goal, Xiaomi has to exceed sales of two giants, Samsung and Apple, which are now placed first and second in top 5 world’s largest smartphone makers.

But that shouldn’t be too hard for Xiaomi, Jun claims, as the Chinese company already has bigger sales in China than Samsung does. Speaking of which, the South Korean handset manufacturer lost quite a lot of market share in China to local OEMs.

Xiaomi is now the most prolific smartphone maker in China, which is the largest market in the world, so becoming #1, even if not a small feat, shouldn’t be seen as almost impossible.

With around 17 million smartphones sold in Q3 2014, Xiaomi has a long road ahead given that Samsung has sold 78 million during the same quarters. Still, once the Chinese company manages to establish a solid foothold in other important international markets, its sales will only get better.

It will be interesting to see how Samsung will be able to tackle Xiaomi’s launch on various international markets, though the South Korean company has already announced it will release fewer smartphones next year.